if you are a super-technologist then there is value in learning all about
linux from every angle try arch. try gentoo. try fedora. try debian. try suse.
they are all good

So, I did. I tried Arch Linux and it is is not
just good, it’s truly brilliant! The truth is, I didn’t take Mark
Shuttleworth’s advice. I took the advice of a quietly spoken work colleague.
Whenever he saw me squirming with irritation at Canonical/Ubuntu he reminded
me (quietly) that he was running Arch Linux and that it was really rather good.
It turns out I should have listened to my colleague years ago,
because he was right all along. He often is.

I started learning Arch Linux a few weeks ago and as of the time of writing
all our home computers are running Arch Linux and so is my office workstation.
I moved away from Ubuntu (which I’ve been using daily since 2004) because:

I often find myself needing/wanting updated packages on my workstations.
Ubuntu + PPAs just wasn’t doing it for me anymore. I concluded I needed a rolling
release distribution.

In my humble opinion, Unity is a software engineering solution developed
(by programmers) not designed using UI-patterns (by user interface designers)
consequently it sucks the big one.

It was less hassle for me to switch to Arch Linux than bend Ubuntu to my will.

That said, I do wish Canonical every success with Unity, they’ll need it. If
they try and ship a smartphone, tablet or TV running Unity they’ll be laughed
out of town. For anyone interested in giving Arch Linux a try here are some observations.

Arch Linux does not hold you hand, you should be competent with a Linux
based distribution. I’ve been using Linux since 0.99patch2 so I think I qualify.